


What happens in Suna (lasts forever)

by Florchis



Category: Naruto
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, Hook-Up, Idiots in Love, Inspired by..., Mondler, Pining, Requited Unrequited Love, Weddings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:21:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28471575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Florchis/pseuds/Florchis
Summary: After he hooks up with a friend at a wedding, Kakashi does not have expectations, but he does have hope. [A sort-of-Mondler AU]
Relationships: Haruno Sakura/Hatake Kakashi
Comments: 16
Kudos: 52





	What happens in Suna (lasts forever)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [StrangeBeautiful](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrangeBeautiful/gifts).



> Written for @StrangeBeautiful for the Secret Santa Exchange at the Kakashi Lounge server! I am sorry this came so late, but I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> Happy New year everyone!
> 
> Rated M for non-explicit sex scenes*.

If there is anything worse than weddings, it would have to be wedding rehearsals. Kakashi knew this before even coming here, and yet he did come, so this whole debacle is entirely on him.

“Come on, you can not leave yet! It is way too early!” Sakura clings to his arm and Kakashi feels like pouting. Of course, she can’t just leave him to brood in peace.

“Haven’t you heard? It is an appropriate hour for someone _my age_ to go to bed.” 

Sakura seizes two flutes of champagne from a server on the fly and pushes one against his chest. She empties out hers rather quickly, while Kakashi holds his precariously while she pushes him again to keep walking around the room.

“You can not get hung up on that, Kakashi. That man was drunk out of his mind. You do not look old enough to be Shikamaru’s father. It probably was just the silver hair that made him say that.”

He steers them towards a couple of empty chairs on a corner, and she allows him to redirect their course; apparently, as long as he does not leave the rehearsal yet, she will be happy. They sit down on the two chairs, and Kakashi sips down on his champagne daintily while Sakura roams the room with her eyes, allowing him some privacy while he is keeping his mask down. It is a very nice salon they chose for the rehearsal, and he can only imagine what is in store for the wedding- he can see Gaara talking to some servers on one side of the room, while Ino is giving shushed instructions to everyone in her wake. Everyone is working hard to make sure that this whole affair goes smoothly, and Kakashi wants to do his part… by going back to bed.

“You should be socializing,” he whispers to Sakura once he has placed the empty flute on a nearby table. 

Sakura smiles and smooths the skirt of her dress down her thighs. It is a [ red ](https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1117/7230/products/Unique_Cute_Short_Red_Prom_Dresses_Cute_Red_Homecoming_Dresses_Popular_Graduation_Dresses_1024x1024.jpg?v=1487082315) dress that goes down to her knees and sits well both with her skin tone and her eyes. He knows it because that was the argument she gave to her to buy it when they went shopping together and she fell in love with it but she didn’t feel it was appropriate for a wedding. _Too flashy, I don’t want to be an attention-stealer,_ she had said. _Wear it to the rehearsal, then_ , he had said out loud, and internally he had thought, _yeah, it catches attention alright._

“I am.”

“With a better catch, I mean.”

“You _are_ a catch, Kakashi.”

“Please, how can I be a catch? I am a single dad with a twenty-seven-year-old son!"

She laughs loud enough for it to become a snort right in the middle, loud enough for people that are six feet away from them to turn around and survey her with curious eyes. Kakashi doesn’t even bother hiding the mirth in his own eyes. Honestly, he would gladly get insulted every minute if it meant he could then use them to make her laugh. 

“You can not be seriously upset about what that man said, Kakashi. He literally congratulated me on the debut of my record, and you and I both know that I can not sing.”

He watches the profile of her face, a couple of locks of hair that have escaped the prison of her bun, the eyeliner that is starting to blur a little to her temple from the heat. He can not tell her that the comment made him self-conscious because he was already feeling guilty. He didn’t feel too old when he met Sakura two years ago at his book club and then somehow started getting along with her friend group; he didn’t have any qualms about being a thirty-five-old man with a twenty-five years old friend, but it somehow wears him down to be a thirty-seven-year-old man who has a crush that is choking him on someone ten years younger.

He can not tell her that, so instead, he says, “Nah. I was just looking for an excuse to cut short my time here.”

It doesn’t even take her two seconds to process his answer that she is already poking him in the ribs. 

“I knew it! But I am not letting you escape your duties as a friend.”

“Sakura, Shikamaru is already dozing off in Temari’s lap

She strains her neck trying to check if he is not lying, and he pokes her side in retaliation for not believing in his word.

“Well, too bad for him, because you and I aren’t leaving before dessert.”

She stands up again and Kakashi complains that his feet hurt- which earns him a ferocious _you should try my heels_ \- but Sakura does not let his excuses deter her from her hunt for sweets. Kakashi allows her to strung him along and even waves at everyone they cross paths with. He wasn’t planning on escaping, but when Sakura gets sucked into an all-girls debate, he can not be blamed for taking the opportunity to make a beeline for his room. 

He knows Sakura will protest about it, but he did say good night to everyone and good luck to Temari right in front of Sakura’s nose- it is not his fault that she was too enthralled in a shouting match with Ino about the order of entrance for the bridesmaids.

He takes a shower before going to bed- weddings are awful, but having them at hotels makes them marginally less terrible-, just to wash from his skin the heat of the evening, the sticky sensation of inadequacy, and his longing for Sakura. The hotel’s shampoo leaves his hair smelling like cacao and it’s odd but not a bad thing, he muses while he slips in his pajamas, mask included.

It’s just the wedding ambiance, he tells himself while he lies on the bed with _Icha Icha Violence_ open on top of his chest: it affects him even if he pretends he doesn’t care about it. Come next week, in their own city, him and Sakura will be back to being two peas in a pod with no complicated feelings in the middle, and this night will be but an unnoticeable blip in their memories.

* * *

He is in the third chapter of his book, still too reckless to sleep when someone knocks on the door. Fully expecting it to be Genma who probably lost his keycard, Kakashi doesn’t even ask before opening the door, which causes him to be standing there in his pajamas with an armful of Sakura.

“Hey, Kakashi, you left without me!” She is not slurring, but behind the reproach there is an edge of her voice that tells him she has drunk more than she had when he last saw her.

“Sorry, didn’t want to be a buzzkill.”

He manhandles her to sit on the foot of the bed trying his damndest best to not fix too much on the layer of sweat that is making her skin glisten. She sits there like a good girl while Kakashi fetches her a glass of water, and she drinks it obediently. Only after that she starts again with her asedium.

“I thought we were having a good time.”

It is hard to tell her that his mood has been fragile around her without either mortally offending her or confessing the truth, two things Kakashi wants to avoid doing at all costs. 

“Yeah, well-”

“That’s why I brought brownies! Whatever got you down, chocolate will make it better.” Her tone of voice is louder than it should be for indoor conversations, and Kakashi hopes that no neighbor comes knocking with a complaint. As far as he knows, the whole floor has been booked by people who were either at the rehearsal or will come tomorrow for the wedding, so they should be safe. “Ino harassed one of the cooks until they gave us a tray and I stole a handful for you.”

She opens her purse and takes out three chocolate brownies wrapped in two paper napkins. Normally he would be opposed to eating on the bed, but the room doesn’t contain other sitting surfaces besides the two twin beds. Sakura doesn’t leave him much time to give an opinion either way before unwrapping one of the brownies and snapping it in half- one piece goes to her mouth immediately while she extends the other one to Kakashi. 

Kakashi sits down next to her with the brownie in one hand, their feet almost touching, and he thinks about offering her a pair of clean socks so she doesn’t have to walk barefooted on the hotel room floor. By the time he raises his head again, he realizes he must have been quiet for too long because she is looking at him with intense eyes.

“You look upset, Kakashi.” He can’t even open his mouth to reply that she is already barging in with the rest of her assumptions. “Don’t tell me that you are still mad about that man who called you old!

He isn’t, not exactly, but he also can’t explain to her the whirlwind of emotions happening inside of him. 

“No, of course not.”

Sakura moves her hand to his knee, and though Kakashi can literally see brownie crumbles flying around, he couldn’t care less about them

“Well, you better not be, because you were the most handsome man in that room tonight.” She is smiling at him but her face looks slightly lopsided. “You are the most handsome man in most rooms, Kakashi.” He inhales sharply and only then realizes that her face was blurry because he had been holding his breath for too long.

“You haven’t even seen my face.” He wishes he had a wittier retort, but he doesn’t- his last two brain cells are too focused on the way she is inching closer to him on the bed. 

Her pale hand is a ghost in between them when she stretches her arm to press her knuckles against his cheek just above the mask.

“I said what I said.”

With time, he would like to come back to this moment and say: _And then was when I kissed her._ But it wouldn’t be true, because there is nothing about this that has been an action on his part; it has all been Sakura, from approaching him on her first day on the book club to the brownies that are crumbling on the duvet of his bed, with their healthy side of flirting: the only thing he has ever done is run behind her, reacting to whatever she throws his way.

The kiss is no exception: he pulls down his mask with one hand and grabs her jaw with the other, but they don’t feel like his hands at all. She is smiling when their lips meet and, to Kakashi, it feels like she has a better grasp of what is going on than him. He realizes quite quickly that he doesn’t need to understand much to enjoy this: Sakura’s dress rustles under his fingers when his hand travels from her cheek to her waist, and her hair, loose from the bun but still stiff with hairspray, tickles his neck. Her lips are soft despite the lipstick, and a primal fire gets ignited in his belly when she opens her mouth and parts her teeth. 

Until the taste of alcohol hits his tongue and he breaks the kiss apart like she is on fire.

“Kakashi?” Her eyes are hooded and her voice rough. Kakashi would like nothing more than to let the fire inside him consume them both, but first, he needs to be sure of this. 

“Sakura, how drunk are you?”

She straightens her spine at the question, and Kakashi almost lets out a relieved sigh when she touches the tip of her nose with her finger on her first try.

“Tipsy enough to be brave. Not drunk enough that you should be worried about taking advantage of me.”

He kisses her again before the words are completely out of her mouth.

* * *

One con about Naruto: he sometimes gets too enthusiastic about something to stop to think about small details like knocking in a hotel room before entering.

One pro about Naruto: he sometimes gets enthusiastic enough that you can hear him coming all the way from the hallway.

It is not much time to prepare, but enough for both of them to wake up and for Sakura to slip under the sheets. 

“Hey, Kakashi!” The greeting comes before he even opens the door, and Kakashi cringes. The loud voice resonates in his sleep-addled brain, and he didn’t even have that much to drink last night. He can’t imagine how painful this must be for Sakura. “You have to wake up! Shikamaru is getting married today!”

“I know, Naruto.” He tries to plaster an irritated but not unkind smile on his face, but the task that would be hard on itself turns near damn impossible while Naruto has a grin from ear to ear on his face and Kakashi is trying to hide the shape of Sakura on his bed. “Did you have to remind me this early?”

Naruto taps his frog-shaped wristwatch, and Kakashi winces when he sees the time on his own phone. It is not as early as he initially believed.

“Temari told me to wake everyone the hell up so we can start getting ready or _else,_ and she is even scarier than Sakura-chan!”

Kakashi can’t help letting out a small chuckle at the comparison, and Sakura pinches his thigh under the covers. He tries to disguise his surprised yelp as a cough.

“Well, I am dutifully up now, Naruto. You can keep up your good job on the rest of the floor.”

Naruto gives him a salute and jogs out of the room with the same vigor as he entered it. What does he eat for breakfast? Cereal soaked in energy drinks? 

Kakashi ponders the pros and cons of getting up to lock the door (pros: door locked and no Naruto; cons: he is not wearing any underwear), but Sakura peaks out from under the covers before he can make a final decision. Her hair is a mess and his heart still flutters at seeing that pink halo laying on his bed. 

“Hey.”

“Do you think he knows I was here?” 

Maybe someone else would be offended that she is so adamant about not being seen with him, but Kakashi can not blame her; the only thing he can think of worse than Naruto finding out would be Ino finding out, and that is just… _shivers._

“Don’t think so. You know how his attention is when he has a task.”

She twists on the bed until she is lying next to him again, the sheet covering her chest higher than her tan line, not that Kakashi is looking closely. 

“Well-”

Her phone rings loudly even from inside her purse and Kakashi curses internally. Whatever it was that she was going to say, he really wants to hear it. Instead, he stares politely to the side while Sakura scrambles to answer her phone while not leaving any skin uncovered he hadn’t already seen on a sunny day.

“Hello? Yes, no, I went for an early… no, what do you mean the MU is not coming? Shit. Yes, I will be there in ten.”

She curses a bit more in a low voice after the call disconnects, and when he finally looks at her, she is the picture-perfect of apologetic.

“I am sorry, Kakashi, but the makeup artist just bailed and an emergency meeting is being called right now.”

“Of course.” He waves his hand to let her know he understands, and then blatantly covers his eyes so she feels comfortable getting dressed. “I understand.”

He waits till the rustle of fabric stops to open up his eyes again, just in time for her to lean down to give him a kiss on the cheek. After the brief contact, she snatches her purse from the floor and walks hastily to the door. With her hand already in the doorknob, she hesitates for an instant and turns around to look at him again.

“This is a rain check,” she states, doesn’t ask, and before Kakashi can reply, she slips out of the room.

* * *

They don’t get another moment to talk until after the wedding. 

They are getting food at the reception when Sakura stands too close to him and pushes him gently with her hip, trying to catch his attention. They have seen each other, of course, but always with someone else around, or having other responsibilities to tackle. She even held his hand during the ceremony, but Kakashi couldn’t tell how much of that was because of last night and how much was just because of their close friendship. Now, she is inching her dish closer to him so he can serve them both, and when she opens her mouth he knows she is going to go straight to business. 

“What we did last night was…” Her sentence lingers in the air unfinished. She probably is waiting for him to finish it, but Kakashi purposefully refuses to do that. This is not about what he thinks of what they did. “...crazy.”

‘Crazy’ is not a big compliment, but it is not an offense either. He can work with ‘crazy’.

“I know, right?” His tone is neutral, carefully measured. If she wants to take it jokingly, she could, and if she wants to take it seriously, she also could. “What were we thinking?”

Sakura shrugs. “We were away?”

Kakashi nods- she is not wrong, after all. “In another city.”

A strange smile takes over her face. “Absolutely. I blame Suna.”

“Bad Suna!” 

Someone fake-coughs at their back while Sakura laughs and Kakashi notices they are blocking everyone’s way to the buffet. He grabs her by the elbow to move the conversation elsewhere, and his bloodstream rumbles when they touch. 

Now in a more secluded nook, Sakura bows her head conspiratorially, her green eyes dark. 

“We can’t let people know- Ino won’t tolerate any scandal at this wedding that doesn’t include her, and I am afraid Gaara would rather kill us both and bury our bodies without anyone noticing than ruining Temari’s wedding.”

Her words drip on his skin like iced water. His defenses go instantly up, and one of the first in his arsenal is humor. 

“Maa, Sakura, you give me too much credit, I wouldn’t go as far as saying we ruin-”

She clutches his forearm with so much force that Kakashi knows she will leave marks. They are standing close enough for their plates, full of rapidly cooling food, to clink against each other.

“But I am still coming over tonight, right?”

Her aloofness about the whole thing still stings, but there is only one thing that he could ever reply to that.

“I mean, we are still in Suna. I don’t think we have a choice.

Her fingers dance down from his forearm to the tender inside of his elbow and Kakashi has to make an extra effort to keep his face under some semblance of control.

“What happens in Suna stays in Suna?”

So bad that it will probably include his heart

* * *

_They don’t even pause until she is on his lap and his lower face, usually covered by his mask, is now covered in red lipstick._

_“Do you know what is weird?” Sakura asks in between heaving breaths._

_“That this doesn’t feel weird?”_

_She neither confirms nor denies his hypothesis. Instead, she plunges his mouth again until he feels dizzy with want and the need for oxygen._

_“You are a really good kisser,” she murmurs against the tender skin of his cheek._

_“You sound surprised_

_She laughs, unabashed. “I should have imagined your lips being very soft since they are always hidden under your mask_

_She might be in complete control of the situation and his heart, but Kakashi still can’t let an opportunity to tease her pass. “Do you spend too much time thinking about my lips, Sakura?”_

_Sakura doesn’t even pretend like she is not avoiding the question when she looks to the side. “Do you have any condoms?”_

_“I do.”_

_Her face lights up with mischief, and Kakashi knows she is going to make him pay back for his teasing._

_“Don’t tell me you were planning on getting lucky, Kakashi!”_

_He places his hand on the back of her head, forcing her to look him in the eyes, and kisses her again. Her muscles relax under the contact and Kakashi would like to have her like this always._

_When they break the kiss, he smiles at her. “You know me, I am a boy scout. Always ready.”_

_Her breathing is still etching, but that doesn't stop her from snaking a hand down his chest and between their bodies._

_“I will be the judge of that.” She squeezes lightly the bulge on his pajama pants, looking pleased with her discovery. “Okay, you_ might _deserve a medal.”_

_Kakashi throws her on the bed._

* * *

‘Tonight’ ends up meaning ‘right now’.

“Ups, Kakashi, I am very sorry.” Kakashi looks down at his sauce-covered shirt and then at Sakura. She doesn’t look sorry in the slightest. “You need a fresh shirt. Let me walk you to your room.”

While they leave the dining room pretending to be sneaky, Kakashi wonders if he ought to be crushed. After all, Sakura has just established that this is a fling for her, something without any strings attached. It is strange because a part of him is looking devastation in the eyes, but the rest of him just feels… cool, and not even in a bad way. If he had to rationalize it, he would say that he always knew he only could have so much of Sakura, he has to receive only what she is willing to give and not long for what he doesn’t get. She is smart and kind and funny; a good friend, a great woman, and an _excellent_ lay; he can not let his feelings get in the way of enjoying all of that. 

“What happened to wait for tonight?” he teases her while they wait for the elevator.

Sakura doesn’t reply for a long time, but the second they step inside the elevator, she pushes him against the mirror.

“You look too good in that suit, Kakashi, I have to take it off you.”

Her palms have shamelessly settled on the curve of his ass, and Kakashi can feel his heart racing in his throat. 

“Smart girl.” She blushes at the praise and oh, that’s interesting. He will have to file away that information for later.

They end up not kissing on the elevator because someone else calls it in between the diner room and Kakashi’s floor, but that only adds stock to the fire. By the time they make it to his door, Kakashi can only congratulate himself on not ripping apart the bridesmaid dress from her curves. He does not give in to the temptation of kissing her, despite Sakura being a bit handsy- he is single-minded in trying to get them both inside. 

He doesn’t even give her a second to try again inside the room. 

“Get on the bed.” Now that he knows what to expect of this, he feels more settled, calmer. He let her take the reins last night because everything was fragile and uncertain, but now he has an appetite for something else. 

“No.” She is fighting him on principle, Kakashi knows. She can be bratty and she doesn’t like to be told what to do. Oh, he will show her how wrong she is.

“Yes.” He insufflates his tone with as much authority as he dares, but he didn’t expect the command to work right away, and yet Sakura bows her head and lays on the bed. Things are going well. He sheds his soiled shirt and tie. “Put your hands on the headboard.” 

Sakura looks at him with eyes full of fire but does as she is told. The movement makes the dress ride dangerously high on her thighs, and Kakashi can already imagine leaving teeth marks on her smooth legs.

Someone knocks on the door.

* * *

_She knocks over his bed lamp in her haste to get the condom, and Kakashi barely manages to catch it in mid-air._

_“Sakura, you are a menace.”_

_“I am single-minded,” she corrects him while she strikes a pose with her hand on her waist and waves the tin-foil package at him with the other hand. “I think it’s really hot.”_

_Kakashi pulls her back to the bed, pushes her hair apart from her face while she rips the condom open._

_“Shouldn’t that be my line?”_

_“I think it goes without saying that you think I am really hot.”_

_Maybe he should be ashamed of being so obvious or turned off by her cockiness, but he is neither. She is not wrong, after all._

_In lieu of reply, he tries to take the condom from her, but she moves her hand a_

_“No, let me show you a neat trick.”_

_She puts the condom inside her mouth and moves down his body to his erection, but after a couple of missed tries, Kakashi ends up patting her head to make her come up again._

_“I really appreciate your effort but I like you more when you are breathing, Sakura.”_

_He wipes off a bit of spit from the corner of her lips. She does not look disappointed but a bit shocked._

_“Damn, the lady at Temari’s bachelorette_ _made it_ _seem so easy.”_

_They laugh and Kakashi grabs a second condom. It is good to still be friends while they are naked._

* * *

Sakura immediately sits up on the bed and shoots him an inquiring glance. Kakashi drops the domineering persona and shrugs. ‘Don’t answer’, she mouths at him, and he nods.

Another, more insistent knock. And then, “Kakashi, I know you are in there!” 

He curses at hearing Genma’s voice. Of course, he would come to interrupt on a moment like this. Of course.

He ignores Sakura’s desperate hand waves and opens the door a tiny fraction, stern on not letting the other man come in.

“Dude, what is going on? Open the door!”

Kakashi prides himself on how collected his voice comes out despite just having Sakura lay like a dessert on his bed not half a minute ago. “I am sorry, Genma. I am busy.”

Genma huffs and adds extra pressure on the door. Kakashi doesn’t buckle. 

“Well, that’s not gonna fly because I got a girl in here!”

His heartbeat spirals out of control and this time it’s not arousal. Friendships have ended for much less, right? 

“I got a girl in here too!”

Genma glares at him, clearly annoyed, and delivers the final blow in a deadpan, “No, you don’t. I saw you going in with Sakura.”

Kakashi feels like hitting his head against the door- no matter how sneaky they had tried to be, chances were high that something would ruin this moment, and Genma’s inability to keep it in his pants was ranked in the top three of the possible issues.

He looks to his bed again, and only when he is sure that Sakura is composed and sitting on the feet of his bed, not even missing her shoes anymore, he releases the tension of his arms and allows Genma to come inside.

“Let me change my shirt first.” 

* * *

“What about your room?” he whispers on their way to the elevator. 

Sakura shakes her head ruefully. “Ino commandeered it as the central base of operations for the wedding party. We could be interrupted at any minute for anything.”

Well, it’s not the end of the world, even if his slacks feel uncomfortably tight and the recently acquired layer of sweat makes Sakura’s skin glisten like a jewel. People hook up at weddings all the time. It shouldn't be hard for them to find a secluded corner to do a reprise of last night. 

Well, it might not be the end of the world, but it definitely isn’t easy.

They start their quest tame enough: there is a barely used, small supply room near the kitchen that Sakura managed to steal the keycard of. They slip inside as discreetly as they can, but they don’t even manage to turn off the lights that a waitress enters right after them searching for clean napkins. She is polite enough to not outright deny their poorly-crafted excuse about checking the stock of red wine, but after running out of there in the middle of bouts of hysterical laughter, they both feel embarrassed enough to not try their luck again.

They don’t even try either of the toilet rooms. There are stereotypes, and then there is _that._

They manage to quietly slip out onto the lobby- it is risky, but the way Sakura tugs on his hand with a death grip makes him emboldened with knowing that she wants this as much as he does. Kakashi has only managed two kisses down Sakura’s neck when Hinata comes looking for her. Kakashi barely has time to hide behind a column and his heart pumps so loudly in his ears that he can’t even hear Sakura’s excuses.

On his way back to the ceremony salon he makes a detour to check if Genma has already vacated their bedroom, both for the obvious reason and because he needs some time to cool off. Not only is Genma still holed up inside, but somehow he managed to block the door so Kakashi can’t even open it with his own keycard, the motherfucker.

He kicks the door for good measure, but there is not much more he can do. On his way back down, he unlocks his cellphone to send his friend a colorful message, but the text he finds from Sakura distracts him from his task completely: 

_There aren’t any more rooms available- I checked :(_

* * *

_“Close your eyes.”_

_“I think we are a bit past that, Sakura,” he laughs, a bit awkwardly. It is rude to stare, but it is hard when every gorgeous curve of her body is shamelessly on display in front of him. Now that he has kissed and touched and enjoyed every last inch of her, it feels somehow harder to let them go._

_Maybe she is onto something about asking him to close his eyes._

_“Kakashi, do you trust me?”_

_It is a weird question to ask when they are both naked and she has just fucked him silly not twenty minutes ago._

_“Do you even have to ask?”_

_“Then close your eyes!”_

_She places both her hands palm wide on his thighs and his breath hitches. He is not even close to being ready to go again, but if Sakura wants to suck him off for a bit, he won't be the one standing in his way. He can handle a bit of head before a second round. Age does come with some perks after all._

_But instead of going higher, she goes lower, hands gliding down his thighs to his knees and his calves to stop on his ankles._

_“Have I mentioned you have the cutest little toes?”_

_“Um, no?”_

_“No peeking!” He makes a big deal of placing his hands on top of his eyes so he is not tempted to peak again. “Better.”_

_Kakashi gasps when she places a soft kiss on the top of the bridge of his right foot and then the other. Every hair on his legs stands on end because of her warm breath. He can understand why she asked him to close his eyes after she nibbles at the side of his knee and he almost jumps a foot in the air- the anticipation of not knowing what she is going to do next makes the exhilaration of her touching him compound even higher._

_She kisses and licks and bites at hand-picked nooks and crevices of his body, to the point that when she finally uses her hands to press down his hips against the mattress, Kakashi feels about ready to crack open for her like a fruit._

* * *

By the time they reunite back in the diner room, Kakashi feels pessimistic and tired, uncomfortable on his own skin. His arousal has dimmed completely and the only thing he is in dire need of is a nap. Once again, age doesn't come on its own.

Still, when he sees Sakura sitting at the table, ferociously guarding against Chōji a piece of cake she saved for him, his clothes still tighten, and not on his crotch area, but on his heart one. Her face lights up at seeing him, and taking her hand is all Kakashi can do to not kiss her then and there. 

“Dance with me,” he asks in a dreamy murmur.

Sakura frowns. “But the cake..."

"Let Chōji have it. I’d rather have this dance with you.”

“Okay.”

The reception is dwindling- he has been so wrapped up in Sakura that he didn’t realize how much time has passed- and the song is one of those that DJs only play to actually dishearten people from dancing.

But not them.

“ _And I just want to stay with you_ [ _in this moment_ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7A0zyiXDZc) _forever_ ”, Sakura sings softly on his ear and Kakashi can’t even remember what she said yesterday about definitely not being a singer.

He just pulls her tighter against his chest and closes his eyes.

* * *

_It is not perfect- there is nothing in this life that can be factually perfect, Kakashi believes. Sakura’s neat condom trip flops, and Kakashi hits his knee on the side of the bed with a particularly hard thrust. They don’t come together in a symphony of perfectly synchronized pleasure. Sakura stops in the middle to put her hair in a perfunctory ponytail and Kakashi places his butt right on top of one of the discarded brownies when they are changing positions._

_But she holds onto his shoulders while she is riding him, and Kakashi has never seen anything more perfect than her wrists, tight with tension. He finishes her off with his hands hard enough to earn him an involuntary snort, and he will be lovingly teasing her about that for the rest of forever. She looks him in the eyes while he is hovering over her, and when Kakashi kisses the side of her jaw, her eyes flutter closed and she lets out a sigh so soft that Kakashi feels it stabbing him in the middle of his lungs._

_She cuddles to his side with sleepy eyes after, and Kakashi presses her closer, both of them sweaty and gross._

_It is, in a way, perfect._

* * *

With Genma still holed up in Kakashi's room and Ino commandeering a small army in and out of Sakura’s, they end the night on one of the couches in the lobby.

Sakura is complaining about her feet hurting while they are planted on Kakashi’s lap, and he starts massaging her soles without a second thought. She stops in the middle of her overdramatic complaint, her voice dropping to a serious one, “Kakashi, you don’t have to do that.”

“I don’t mind.”

She is silent for a long time, long enough that Kakashi wonders if maybe he should stop. But he doesn’t. 

“Maybe it’s good that we never got to have a second night, right?” she finally breaks the silence after a while, not looking him in the eye while she speaks. “It makes that one night special.”

Kakashi tries to not feel like she slapped him in the face. _It’s good that you still got to have this,_ he says to himself. _Don’t ruin everything just because you are in love with her._

“... right.”

“Kakashi, oh my God!” He almost jumps in the air at Sakura’s outraged cry, but instead, he just squeezes her feet with much more force than necessary, and Sakura gasps.

“What?!? What is wrong?”

Her feet have angry red marks, both from her shoes and from his nails, and Kakashi rubs at them guiltily to no avail. Sakura waves his hands away to put her feet back down on the floor. 

Instead of answering his question, Sakura shoots another one at him. “Did you really think you’d get away with it? That I wouldn’t realize you are lying to me? I thought we were better friends than this.” 

She sounds mad, but her eyes are sad, and Kakashi runs a million escape plans inside his mind. It’s late enough to be early, and he might not be Cinderella, but he clearly already pushed the limits of his luck with this night.

“I don’t know what you mean.” 

Sakura inhales deeply and he blocks out of his mind the image of how he kissed her solar plexus last night.

“At first I thought your lack of pushback when it came to what this meant and letting people know and everything was proof of your lackluster interest in me.” Kakashi blinks. What is she even talking about? She has been the one to decide how this was going to run ever since the beginning. He has only been going with the flow! “I was hurt, but I could deal with this being a fling. There is nothing bad with sleeping with a friend you find completely hot, right?”

There is something lodged in his throat and it might be the last glass of champagne he had an hour ago but it might also be a knot of all his unsaid feelings. Maybe a bit of both. He can only push one word past that, “No.”

Sunshine is starting to pour in through the glass panels of the lobby and the natural light emphasizes the lack of sleep in Sakura’s features and how much her makeup has run and blurred through the night. Kakashi has never found her more beautiful. 

If the conversation started with her looking away, now Sakura is fully focused on him- if that kind of attention makes him shrink when it comes from someone else, now that it comes from Sakura, he can feel himself blossoming.

“I could accept us being only friends.” Her voice is soft but full of feeling and Kakashi can’t breathe. “But you keep saying and doing things that make me… I don’t know.” She shakes her head, pink and gold from the sun shining on the top of her head like a halo and Kakashi wants, wants, wants. “That I could accept it doesn’t mean it is what I want, necessarily. So, please, I am asking you, as your friend, be honest, and be selfish. What do you want?”

In any other circumstances, Kakashi, a man of not many words, would have just kissed her. But they have already had their fair share of misunderstanding, and she is asking him with bright eyes: he owes her this, at the very least. 

“I want everything with you, Sakura. I just wasn’t sure we were on the same page about it.”

She presses a palm against his chest, and Kakashi is glad; maybe like this, she will be able to keep his racing heart contained. 

“I wasn’t happy when we were interrupted yesterday either. And with the raincheck, I meant sex, yes, but I also meant talking and letting you know that I had, um.” She interrupts herself, her cheeks reddening. Kakashi scoots closer, avid to hear more.

“That you had what, Sakura?” he asks in a husky tone at the same time that he pushes apart a strand of hair, leaving her neck exposed.

“That I had been thinking about you like that for quite some time now.”

Kakashi places an open-mouthed kiss just under her earlobe, delighted when Sakura shivers at the contact.

“I am sorry I had doubts when you were so desperate to not be found on my bed.” 

Sakura rolls her eyes and Kakashi, giddy, thinks about how many new ways to make her do that exact same gesture he will have at his disposal now. 

“Well, you gotta back me up on this, Kakashi: I couldn’t let Naruto be the one to spread the news. If I wanted us getting together to be a full-scale scandal, I would have told Ino myself. ”

Kakashi rubs his nose against her neck. They will have to stop very soon if they don’t want that particular piece of gossip to spread like a petroleum leak, but there is no one around yet and he feels bold.

“Fair.”

“Let me make it up to you. Stay with me here one more night.”

She is biting her lip, bashful and provocative at the same time, and there is a lot he learned about her from their one night together and their many failed attempts that he is now dying to put under a much in-depth analysis.

“On one condition: no more twin bedrooms for me.”

Sakura laughs and it is amazing how love can make your world feel wider and brighter in only 36 hours. 

“Deal.” 

**Author's Note:**

> *Man, did I think this was going to come out smuttier than it did. I am so writing something smuttier for them soon, if any of you have prompts!  
> **  
> This story is part of LLF Comment Project, whose goal is to improve communication between readers and authors. This author invites:
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